Search form

You are here

15% Multi-grain Bread With YW and SD Combo Levain

15% Multi-grain Bread With YW and SD Combo Levain

This bread originally started out to be baguettes along the line of the one Ian (isand66) baked this last week only with the addition of SD to his YW only levain.

I was going to do a Pierre Nury take, no slash, Rustic Light Rye approach to it where you just cut a 10” square proofed dough into (2) 5”x10” rectangles, stretch the dough to 12”and just let it plop on the parchment - no slashing required and then right into the oven it goes. But then, my wife needs sandwich bread too?

The SD /YW combo levain was under way when Pip’s (Phil) latest fabulous bread hid TFL. I decided to change the dough flours around to match his 15 % of fresh milled whole grains even though we used a multigrain approach, since they were already ground earlier in the day, which was different than Phil’s spelt. Both Ian and Phil used 75% hydration so we went with that.

We cut Phil’s recipe to 1,200 g from 3,600. We also decided to use Phil’s method of 6 hour levain build, long autolyse (5-6 hours) holding back some water, 3 minutes French fold (I used French Slap and Folds thinking they might be the same thing and we like doing them), add in the salt and the rest of water and squeezing the dough through the fingers until it come back together, another 3 minutes of French slap and folds, and a 4 hour bulk rise with no touching – no stretch and folds.

We pre-shaped and shaped going into a basket for 2 hours of proof on the counter, then into the fridge for a 12 hour retard. It came out of the fridge in the morning nicely risen for another hour of warm up before going into the steaming mini oven oven at 500 F, steaming for 12 minutes with oven turned down to 450 F after 2 minutes.

Since my levain was already 21% of the final dough weight instead of the 10% that Phil used, I decided to cut the 4 hour bulk ferment in half to 2 hours undisturbed and the final proof from 2 hours to 1 hour before going into the fridge. The rest of Phil’s method was not modified other than we went with a boule instead of a batard and used Ian’s signature T-Rex scoring since we skipped his baggies but we will do them soon.

Somehow Pierre Nury’s cut and stretch Rustic Method was not incorporated and he deserves better than that so we will use it next time. It is odd how things can change based on a really good bread posted on TFL – like Phil’s. Mine won’t come out as nice as Phil’s but, just the thought that it might, is worth the doing.

The scoring went well as my apprentice modified, (bent), our single side razor blade into a gentle curve like a lame blade. The boule puffed itself up very well during the 12 minute steaming using a combination of (1) of Sylvia’s steaming cups and our latest bake’ bottom broiler pan with ½ C of water, covered with the vented top of the broiler pan where the parchment and bread bakes.

After the steam came out, we baked the bread at 400 F, convection this time, for an additional 16 minutes (28 minutes overall) turning the boule 90 degrees every 4 minutes. When the center hit 205 F we turned off the oven, left the door ajar and allowed the boule to cool in the oven for an additional 12 minutes. The temperature rose to 209 F while resting in the off mini oven.

The bread sprang so much it was little close to the top elements and got a little dark on the top but, no worries, it wasn’t burnt and should add a little extra yumminess to the crust. The mini (and steam) provided its signature blisters to the crust. It came out crunchy crisp and shattered and cracked where it got the hottest as it cooled. The crust softened as it cooled to become chewy.

The bottom wasn’t as brown as usual. This has to be due to the water in the lower half of the broiler pan that was less than an1” from the bread. Even though the spring was great with blisters we will go back to either Sylvia’s steam alone or covering the bread with a stainless steel bowl which will also keep the top from browning too much and still give us dark brown bottom crust and blisters.

This is also the largest boule we can possibly put in the mini oven. It stuck to steaming cup and the side of the broiler pan as it was. We think a loaf that was 200 g less in size would be more prudent.

The crumb came out fairly open but nearly as much as Phil’s did. This because he is such a fine baker and my apprentice is not. Plus, we used YW and cut the counter development time by about 2 hours or so to take into account we used twice as much levain.

But the crumb was glossy, moist, airy and light like our recent YW.SD bakes have been. We will follow Phil’s methods more closely next time. The taste is very good Just what my wife will like for her lunch sandwich bread.

your breads are. Your latest is just one example of bread perfection. We can't seem to get your crumb structure and holes in anything we bake but we will some day with practice or, we will at least think we did :-)

My wife likes it a lot, she wants less sour and not full of stuff she doesn't like. Success - she took it for lunch.

DA...looks like to me you came up with a great adaptation of Phil's bread. That crumb looks really nice and I'm sure the taste is just right. Throw a little olive oil, some grated cheese and grill it up finished with some fresh Moz. and you are in business! Nice job. I look forward to seeing your attempt at the baguettes. I have another batch ready to go into the oven in a couple of hours. I can't eat them though until tomorrow night as I'm atoning for my sins...and there are a lot of them :).

this would make a good base for a bruschetta type appetizer. It tastes good and my wife is taking it for her lunch sandwich which is saying something. For me it is a little on the light side for whole grains with no soaker or sprouts. Your rustic Pierre Nury no slash type baggies are up next. Hope yours came out well.

My secondattempt came out okay. Tastes great but I need a little more practice handling these and doing the shaping. I'm going to try a straight sourdough version of these next to see the difference. After that I will try the Txfarmer version again. I'm working on a multi-grain bread with some sweet potatoes and wine. I am not sure you will taste tyeh wine since I added so many grains but we will hope for the best. I used some fresh milled spelt and soft white wheat. I think I am with you and I need to look at getting a mill. I was thinking about the Kitchen Aide attachment which costs about $125.

I'm guessing you are using white wine? Multi-grain with potatoes is right up your ally. Baggies are hard to deal with at 75% hydration if you don't use any extra flour. I made mine into one 787 g x 16" long batard kind of thing. I decided to slash it rather than pull it out and let it plop as it is already is as long as my round stone can take. It is retarding till tomorrow morning.

I'm up late tonight doing some SD YW English Muffins. The wife asked for one for breakfast this morning and we were out. These things just shouldn't happen.

I was thinking about the Kitchen Aid. I think Phil has a Komo? Have you heard anything about the KA attachment?

makes me wonder sometimes if I'm not a lot like my sd starter...sometimes full of energy and light and other times dull and slow, sometimes shiny and new and sometimes dark and not real presentable in polite company--at the risk of being too nerdy I guess I'm just glad that there is always that bit of good just waiting to be renewed-- in my starter and in me (I hope)

analogy all SD bread bakers can understand. The sunset was the result of contrails from high flying planes taking the bad away, hopefully never to be seen again. Reflection, atonement and renewal are the stuff of a good life well lived.

That's a beauty, DA. Even at 15% multi MULTI-grain you really don't kid around, do you?! It must taste amazing. This is one more nudge toward me someday getting a grain mill - being able to grind all the grains to flour for a smooth multi-grain approach (not that I have anything against chunky multi-grain breads, but the more options the better!). Nice!

After burning up the old Krups coffee grinder on the 100% whole Kamut bread and having to use the one we save for coffee for this one - a mill might be in order. Just hate to spend a bunch of money for a couple of loaves of bread a week. Will have to check the search and see if there is a good cheap one out there.

This is a nice 'white' bread with just enough whole grain to make it interesting, a little more healthy and better tasting in my book. Still it could use some sprouts or something. These kinds of bread help you use up little bits and pieces of grain before they go bad.

Making more white bread today, with 15% white whole wheat, like Phil's with 4 hour bench rest, no S&F's to make into Ian's baggies using Pierre Nury's no slash rustic method. Makes my head spin but it should be fun.

The wife took this bread to work 2 days in a row now.

Thanks for the nice comment and let me know what you find out about grain mills.

Hi dabrownman,So many good things in this bread of yours - your wife must be so grateful you baked this beautiful bread for her :^)The crumb is nice and bubbly, as is the crust - very pretty. Lovely sunset photo, too!I am very impressed by the bread you bake with yeast water and one of these days I should try using it.:^) breadsong

It is fun to mess around with YW. I like it best mixed with SD unless we are making Japanese sandwich bread. YW sure helps to open the crumb. I was most impressed with the open crumb of the 100% rye. Never seen or tasted one so light and airy like that before. Am really glad that we have figured out a way to bake bread in the mini oven, Sure saves on the electric bill during the summer. You would have all kinds of fun with YW. My English Muffins just beeped. Time to dry fry.

Thanks for stopping by with a comment. Really liked your write up on the kneading conference. Will have to make it next year.

Such a beautiful result, DA! The proofed dough looked so smooth. Too bad the oven top elements browned the loaf a bit too much. I agree with Phil, The crumb is excellent, given all the grain mix. Keep at it, you'll get there, but keep in mind that you'll have to bake a single recipe many time in order to perfect the crumb, as phil did.

It's sometimes hard to keep the top elements away from the bread when it springs well and you only have a total of 9" to work with. We like a dark nearly burnt crust anyway. We keep plugging away at baking as good a bread as we can every day. We will get better since that is out goal. Experience comes with time well spent.

All original site content copyright 2016 The Fresh Loaf unless stated otherwise. Content posted by community members is their own. The Fresh Loaf is not responsible for community member content. If you see anything inappropriate on the site or have any questions, contact me at floydm at thefreshloaf dot com. This site is powered by Drupal and Mollom.